3 YEARS AGO, Obama econ. team pushed for health-reform czar w/ expertise in technology -- No one could say, 'My job is the seamless implementation of the Affordable Care Act' -- KATIE HOGAN is 30

BITE DU JOUR -- N.J. GOV. CHRIS CHRISTIE, to NBC’s Kelly O’Donnell, aired on “Meet the Press,” on whether he’s planning to use his expected reelection landslide on Tuesday to send a message beyond New Jersey: “I'm not planning for it; I just think it's inevitable. … [P]eople look at elections and they try to discern things about what they mean at that moment, and what they mean for the future. And I think that what people are going to see is so unusual for what our party has created in the last couple years, that invariably people are going to draw lessons from it -- and I hope that they do.”

TOP TALKER – “Schumer endorses Clinton in Iowa,” by Des Moines Register’s Jennifer Jacobs: “Schumer … used the Iowa Democratic Party’s Jefferson Jackson dinner as the platform for his endorsement. ‘I have found my 2016 candidate,’ he told the audience of about 750 people at Hy-Vee Hall at the Iowa Events Center in Des Moines. ‘She’s a virtual guarantee to deliver victory for our party in 2016.’ Schumer said his candidate will galvanize the center, both Reagan Democrats and Clinton Republicans, as well as young voters and women who rarely vote or haven’t voted for a Democrat in years. ‘This candidate is perfectly suited to succeed in the Iowa caucuses. So let’s all stick together and make sure that Ted Cruz is the Republican candidate in 2016! … Fooled you, didn’t I?’ … Schumer said 2008 was the right time for Barack Obama, ‘but 2016 is Hillary’s time.’” http://goo.gl/Bxbv9P

SAVE THIS TAPE! Sen. Rand Paul, to George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s “This Week,” on whether Sen. Ted Cruz will be Paul’s chief rival if he seeks the 2016 Republican nomination: “I think we're a long way away from that. I haven't even convinced my wife yet whether I should do this. So we're a ways away from making a decision. So, uh, but no, Ted and I are friends. And he's a limited government conservative. We don't always agree on everything, but we agree on a lot of things. So I won't be coming on television to try to disparage him, whether we're ever rivals or not.”

SCOOP – FRANK BRUNI, “The Tumbling Boundaries of Gay Rights: We’re most definitely not in Kansas anymore”: “ELLIOTT MANAGEMENT’S lofty offices in Midtown Manhattan look north, south, east and west across the borough’s thicket of skyscrapers. … I sat in a 30th-floor library with the hedge fund’s founder and chief executive, Paul Singer, a billionaire who was one of the most important donors to Mitt Romney in 2012, gives generously to a range of Republican causes and prefers to do this with a minimum of media notice. … But here he was giving an interview, my second with him in 16 months, because the focus both times was gay equality. … In this case, he was announcing a new project to be funded, at least at the outset, by him and other conservative donors but to be run by the Human Rights Campaign, an L.G.B.T. advocacy group in Washington, which is much more closely affiliated with Democrats.

“The initiative will be dedicated to fighting the victimization of gays and lesbians internationally. But it will also show that there are Republicans … who are intent on progress and justice for L.G.B.T. people. … [Singer] is close to, and has discussed gay rights with, Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who recently backed off a legal challenge to gay marriage … Singer has had such talks with Senator Rob Portman … Singer also has a gay son — and a gay son-in-law. The two men are married. His vision of how Republicans must evolve was echoed by] Daniel Loeb, another New York hedge-fund billionaire who has given lavishly to conservatives. Loeb is Singer’s principal financial partner in the H.R.C. international project; Singer has already committed $1.5 million, and Loeb has promised a similar amount over its first years.” http://goo.gl/GvPl7q

SPAGHETTI-LIKE GRAPHIC from WashPost, “What went wrong with HealthCare.gov … Some individuals with low incomes are being told they are not eligible for subsidies or don’t qualify for Medicaid, even though they should. … The software sends a report to each insurer listing people who have enrolled that day. … The reports … are sometimes confusing and duplicative, making it difficult for insurance companies to know who their new customers really are.” http://goo.gl/ZcAi9S

SUNDAY BEST -- DAN PFEIFFER, on “This Week,” on Healthcare.gov: “Jeff Zients [who was named to manage repair of the site, and takes over in Jan. as Obama’s economic adviser] … said … to us as recently [as] this week that based on the work they've done, that they believe they can get the website working smoothly for the vast majority of Americans by the end of this month. … [T]he good news here is that, the history of programs like this, like in Massachusetts, is that most people sign up toward the end. [In] Massachusetts, … 0.03 percent of the overall population who ended up signing up signed up in that first month. So there's time here. There's no question we have to get this done by the end of this month. …

“[T]he first enrollment numbers, which [will be] released later this month, are not going to be what we want them to be. There's no question about that. The website hasn't worked the way we want it to work. But we take responsibility for that, take responsibility for the errors, take responsibility for fixing it. And if we get the website working … by the end of this month, then I think we're going to be in a good place. … [T]he Web site failures are absolutely inexcusable and we own that. That is -- as a president, that's on him. We have to fix it.”

PFEIFFER ADDS FINE PRINT: “[I]f you had a plan before the Affordable Care Act passed, it hasn't been changed or canceled, you can keep it.”

--On the possibility of some kind of clemency for Edward Snowden: “None. … Not that's been discussed. He -- look, Mr. Snowden violated U.S. law. … [O]ur belief has always been that he should return to the U.S. and face -- and face justice.”

--On why research was done on the effect of switching Joe Biden for Hillary Clinton as running mate, as hyped in the upcoming “Double Down,” by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann: “Research is done on a lot of things. … This was never seriously considered. Never taken to the president. I can tell you, no one in the campaign as well as the president ever serious considered this in any way shape or form.”

--On Obama saying “I just don't know if I can do this,” on recovering from the first debate (the cover quote for New York magazine’s forthcoming “Double Down” excerpt): “There's no question the first debate did not go as well as anyone would have hoped. But he bounced back in the second and the third. It took work to get there. It took work from the president and his team. So, I think all of that is sort of half history.”

FALL BACK: Your devices automatically gave you an extra hour of sleep. (Josh Deckard says it doesn’t quite work that way if you have three kids.) We jabbed the WashPost for omitting a reminder from yesterday’s paper. It was missing from the copies we got here in the wilds of Rosslyn. But it turns out that the Post added it for later editions, replacing a Real Estate tease.

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PALACE INTRIGUE -- WashPost A1, above fold, “Healthcare.gov: How a start-up failed to launch: POLITICAL FEARS VS. TECHNICAL NEEDS – Bells sounded that Oct. 1 rollout was too soon,” by Amy Goldstein and Juliet Eilperin (online headline: “How political fear was pitted against technical needs”): “In May 2010, two months after the Affordable Care Act squeaked through Congress, President Obama’s top economic aides were getting worried. Larry Summers, director of the White House’s National Economic Council, and Peter Orszag, head of the Office of Management and Budget, had just received a pointed four-page memo from a trusted outside health adviser. It warned that no one in the administration was ‘up to the task’ of overseeing the construction of an insurance exchange and other intricacies of translating the 2,000-page statute into reality. Summers, Orszag and their staffs agreed. For weeks that spring, a tug of war played out inside the White House … On one side, members of the economic team and Obama health-care adviser Zeke Emanuel lobbied for the president to appoint an outside health reform ‘czar’ with expertise in business, insurance and technology. On the other, the president’s top health aides … argued that they could handle the job. …

“The president had already made up his mind… Obama wanted his health policy team — led by Nancy-Ann De­Parle, director of the White House Office of Health Reform — to be in charge of the law’s arduous implementation. … Three and a half years later, such insularity — in that decision and others that would follow — has emerged as a central factor in the disastrous rollout … ‘They were running the biggest start-up in the world, and they didn’t have anyone who had run a start-up, or even run a business,’ said David Cutler, a Harvard professor and health adviser to Obama’s 2008 campaign, who was not the individual who provided the memo to The Washington Post but confirmed he was the author. … Inside the Department of Health and Human Services’ Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, the main agency responsible for the exchanges, there was no single administrator whose full-time job was to manage the project. …

“[F]or months beginning last spring, the president emphasized the exchange’s central importance during regular staff meetings to monitor progress. No matter which aspects of the sprawling law had been that day’s focus, … Obama invariably ended the meeting the same way: ‘All of that is well and good, but if the Web site doesn’t work, nothing else matters.’ … ‘There wasn’t a person who said, “My job is the seamless implementation of the Affordable Care Act.”’ … A [high-level] monthly meeting, intended to work through tough regulatory questions, was attended at first by Sebelius, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and Domestic Policy Council Director Melody Barnes. By late summer and early fall of 2010, the meetings petered out after some of the participants stopped attending …

“CMS staff members struggled at ‘multiple meetings’ during the spring of 2011 to persuade White House officials for permission to publish diagrams known as ‘concepts of operation,’ which they believed were necessary to show states what a federal exchange would look like. … [T]he White House was reluctant because the diagrams were complex, and they feared that the Republicans might reprise a tactic from the 1990s … After the election, Cutler, the Harvard professor, renewed his warnings that the White House had not put the right people in charge. ‘I said, “You have another chance to get a team in place,”’ he recalled. Nothing changed. … On Dec. 19, Obama met with roughly a dozen senior White House and HHS officials, including Sebelius. … The health-care law, he told the gathering, … was ‘the most important thing’ in his presidency. ‘We’ve got to do it right.’” http://goo.gl/coKb9b

--AP FOR MONDAY PAPERS – “Obama's health law finally gets real for America,” by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, with Michael Rubinkam in Allentown, Pa.: “At least 3.5 million Americans have been issued cancellations, but … data is unavailable in half the states. Mainly they are people who buy directly from an insurer, instead of having workplace coverage. Officials say these consumers aren't getting ‘canceled’ but ‘transitioned’ or ‘migrated’ to better plans because their current coverage doesn't meet minimum standards. They won't have to go uninsured, and some could save a lot if they qualify for the law's tax credits. Speaking in Boston's historic Faneuil Hall this past week, Obama said the problem is limited to fewer than 5 percent of Americans … But in a country of more than 300 million, 5 percent is a big number -- about 15 million people. …

“A different prong of Obama's coverage expansion seems to be doing fairly well. It's an expanded version of Medicaid, embraced so far by 25 states and the District of Columbia. An informal survey of 14 of those states by AP hows that at least 240,000 people had enrolled in or applied for the expanded safety-net program as of the third week of October. … Expect [insurance] cutbacks to be blamed on the law. Sorting out whether that's warranted may be difficult.” http://goo.gl/DiCmE7

DEEP DIVE – N.Y. Times 2-col. lead, “ No Morsel Too Minuscule For All-Consuming N.S.A.: From Spying on Leader of U.N. to Tracking Drug Deals, an Ethos of ‘Why Not?’” by Scott Shane: “A review of classified agency documents obtained by Mr. Snowden and shared with The New York Times by The Guardian, offers a rich sampling of the agency’s global operations and culture. … The C.I.A. dispatches undercover officers overseas to gather intelligence today roughly the same way spies operated in biblical times. But the N.S.A., born when the long-distance call was a bit exotic, has seen its potential targets explode in number with the advent of personal computers, the Internet and cellphones. Today’s N.S.A. is the Amazon of intelligence agencies … It sucks the contents from fiber-optic cables, sits on telephone switches and Internet hubs, digitally burglarizes laptops and plants bugs on smartphones …

“The documents are skewed toward celebration of the agency’s self-described successes, as underlings brag in PowerPoints to their bosses about their triumphs and the managers lay out grand plans. But they do not entirely omit the agency’s flubs and foibles: flood tides of intelligence gathered at huge cost that goes unexamined; intercepts that cannot be read for lack of language skills … By many accounts, the agency provides more than half of the intelligence nuggets delivered to the White House early each morning in the President’s Daily Brief — a measure of success for American spies. (One document boasts that listening in on Nigerian State Security had provided items for the briefing ‘nearly two dozen’ times.)” http://goo.gl/Zvedng

2016 WATCH – “Romney leaves Cruz off his list of 2016 GOP stars – AP: On “Meet the Press,” Romney mentioned “[h]is ex-running mate, Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. But Romney says New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie ‘stands out as one of the very strongest lights.’ Romney was asked … whether Texas Sen. Cruz is a ‘potential light.’ Romney said he's not going to disqualify anybody. But he made clear that he had given the names of those he thought were ‘the most effective in becoming elected.’”

SPORTS BLINK – COLLEGE FOOTBALL – “No. 3 Florida State gains ground on new AP poll,” by AP College Football Writer Ralph D. Russo: “No. 3 Florida State gains ground on No. 1 Alabama and No. 2 Oregon in The Associated Press college football poll, earning four more first-place votes than it did last week. The Seminoles are coming off another easy victory against a previously unbeaten rival. Florida State beat Miami 41-14 on Saturday night and received six-first-place votes from the media panel Sunday. Last month the Seminoles handed Clemson its first loss. Alabama remains No. 1 with 52 first-place votes, three less than last week. Oregon received two first-place votes, a loss of one for the Ducks. Miami's first loss drops it seven spot to 14th. Notre Dame moved back into the rankings at No. 24 and Michigan fell out after losing to Michigan State. The Spartans advance six spots to 18th. ”

--“Top 25 Rdp … Ohio State, Michigan State in control of Big Ten” – AP: “No. 4 Ohio State laid another beating on an overmatched conference foe, and No. 24 Michigan State took control of the Big Ten's other division with a rout of Michigan. The Buckeyes … crushed Purdue 56-0 in West Lafayette, Ind. Ohio State has won 21 straight and has been far and away the Big Ten's most impressive team. The Buckeyes appear to be cruising toward a Leaders Division title and their first Big Ten title game. They have a one-game lead over Wisconsin, a team they've already beaten … Michigan State and the nation's No. 1 defense were even more impressive. The Spartans pummeled their rivals 29-6 in East Lansing, Mich., and have a game and a half lead in the Legends Division.”

DESSERT – “Netflix gets into original-film game with 'The Square,’” L.A. Times Steven Zeitchik: Chief Content Officer “Ted Sarandos and Netflix are looking to make a splash with an original film released under the Netflix banner. The online entertainment company is in final negotiations to acquire exclusive rights to ‘The Square,” a documentary about the Egyptian revolution that has won prizes at … Sundance and Toronto film festivals … The idea would be to release the movie … in the coming months in the manner of its original TV-style series, such as ‘House of Cards’ and ‘Orange Is the New Black’ … [M]ore documentaries are likely in the cards … [P]ublic screenings of [‘The Square’] Friday in Los Angeles already showed the Netflix logo. Shot in Cairo over a period of several years by Jehane Noujaim (‘Control Room’), ‘The Square’ examines a group of activists of various stripes in Tahrir Square …

“The deal puts Netflix into the thick of Oscar season barely a month after it was a force at the Emmys with multiple nominations for buzzy political soap opera ‘House of Cards.’ ‘The Square’ is currently getting a self-financed Oscar-qualifying run in New York and Los Angeles and is tabbed as a favorite in the documentary category. … The news comes less than a week after Netflix Chief Content Officer Sarandos offered bold statements about original film that could be released by Netflix, effectively shutting out theaters. Sarandos told a Film Independent gathering that ‘the model that we’re doing for TV should work for movies. Why not premiere movies the same day on Netflix that they are opening in theaters?’

“While documentary is a less sensitive subject for large theater chains, which do a comparatively small amount of business in the nonfiction arena … observers are likely to see the acquisition as an opening salvo for the upstart entertainment company and a move that puts it in the original-film game much faster than many thought. … Two weeks ago [Netflix] boasted in an earnings call that, thanks to series such as ‘House of Cards’ and ‘Orange Is the New Black,’ its subscriber numbers now exceed those of HBO.” http://goo.gl/A4WJtQ

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About The Author

Mike Allen is the chief White House correspondent for POLITICO. He comes to us from Time magazine where he was their White House correspondent. Prior to that, Allen spent six years at The Washington Post, where he covered President Bush's first term, Capitol Hill, campaign finance, and the Bush, Gore and Bradley campaigns of 2000. Before turning to national politics, he covered schools and local governments in rural counties outside Fredericksburg, Va., for The Free Lance-Star, then wrote about Doug Wilder, Oliver North, Chuck Robb and the Bobbitts for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, where he nurtured police sources on overnight ride-alongs through housing projects. Allen also covered Mayor Giuliani, the Connecticut statehouse and the wacky rich of Greenwich for The New York Times. Before moving to The Times, he did stints in the Richmond and Alexandria bureaus of The Washington Post. Allen grew up in Orange County, Calif., and has a B.A. from Washington and Lee University, where he majored in politics and journalism.